Friday, July 23, 2010

Pro MMA fighter Jon Fitch is currently training for his upcoming match with Thiago Alves for UFC 117. I spent a couple of days at the American Kickboxing Academy in San Jose shooting Fitch and his training staff preparing for battle.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

I shot something that I have never done before, I photographed a jet and a jet engine in my studio... no I do not have a massive studio the size of a hangar. Ronnie Romiti is an avid Remote Control Jet Enthusiast that installed a controversial part into his RC A-4 and was able to make it work. RC Jet International's April/May edition featured some of my photography of Ronnie and his jet, and we also made it to the cover.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

The Girls from Silicon Valley had their first bout of the season tonight against San Diego Derby Doll's "Hard Corps" and Tacoma Washington's Dockyard Derby Dames. I've been wanting to test out Canon's 7d and the new 1d Mark IV along with Profoto's D1 Air system, so I rented the 7d and the D1's from BorrowLenses.com in San Mateo. (The Mark IV was unavailable... I'll get to that camera soon) I found the focusing system on the 7d to be pretty impressive as I was able to track the skaters pretty easily as they were moving toward me. I seemed to lose focus as they travelled laterally in front of me around the turn. I think however it may have been due to low light levels and maybe a rapid change in direction of the skaters. I will test this further at the Santa Cruz Derby Girls venue this weekend which is well lit.

The Canon 7d has the ability to shoot Full Resolution HD video. I found it awkward to operate the 7d as a video camera having to look at the screen at the back of the camera instead of through an optical viewfinder. Manual focusing was diffilcult, especially when shooting a moving subject like Roller Derby. I think the best way to operate the 7d as a video camera is to set it up like a motion picture camera with a follow focus unit and an assistant to pull focus. Companies like Redrock Micro make DSLR support systems that allows you to do this. This is something I definately will use due to my background in Cinematography. Overall the 7d is a remarkable camera, and is priced under 2K. I am pretty excited to get my hands on the 1d Mark IV to see what that camera can do.

I want to be able to set up and control multiple lights wirelessly at the various Roller Derby bouts I shoot. Profoto's Air system I believe is the solution to what I want to do. I rented a pair of these lights and was able to control their intesities using a remote without having to go to each light physically to do so. This isn't a big deal in the studio, however if you have lights rigged high up or on tall light stands all over an arena it becomes to be a pain. Using Profoto's Air Remote I was able to dial in exactly the light levels I wanted standing on the track rather than running back and forth from the track to the light. Using Profoto's Studio air and the USB Air Remote, you can control multiple lights from your laptop wirelessly. This means I can have different lighting setups preprogrammed and ready depending on where I want to shoot on the track.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Central Coast Coach Gabe Kahuna Kamakani's Skaters and Cpl. Punisher Derby Revolution of Bakersfield played an outstanding game tonight at the Paso Robles Event center. Either I haven't seen a game in a while or the girls were hitting really hard. I finally got to meet Kahuna and his team after talking with them for months. Both Kahuna and I were in the Marines so I felt like I have known him for years. Kahuna definitely had the better duty stations. When I was suffering at the worst duty stations the Marine Corps had to offer, (Italy and Hawaii) Kahuna had the good life at Camp Lejeune. Sorry Kahuna. The venue CCRD Skates in is perfect for a Roller Derby Photographer.... there's power available everywhere and there are plenty of places to rig strobes so you can leave the lightstands behind. I can not wait to shoot there again.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

If you have "google voice" you have heard the voice of actress and voice over talent Laurie Burke. Laurie has appeared in numerous commercials, television shows, on film, in theater and in commercial print ads. For as long as I have known her she always has some type of project going on, I am happy for one evening Laurie sat still enough for me to photograph her.

I want to thank all my family, friends and the ladies in the Roller Derby community who voted for my photographs in the Profoto Competition back in October 2009. Right before the New Year I got a phone call from Matt Hill and Ron Egatz from Profoto telling me of the great news. With all your support I was able to win the monthly competition for October which puts me in competition for the Profoto Grand Prize in May 2010. In addition to that, Profoto features monthly winners on their websites, in print ads and on their blog which is a great opportunity for exposure for all the winning photographers. The Photograph of SVRG's Dollface and OCRG's Wild Bella from the Silicon Valley Roller Derby game vs the OC Roller Girls is the photograph that will be used in the print ads and online during the month of February. Once again I am very thankful to all of you that helped make this happen, I am grateful to have so many supportive people in my life.